US Marines try to push into the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. Trooping past dead bodies and abandoned weapons, U.S. Marines fighting their way through Iraq's rebel-infested Fallujah are blasting their way through walls and hammering open doors seeking fighters and guns in the dayslong battle against Sunni Muslim insurgents. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus) less

US Marines try to push into the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. Trooping past dead bodies and abandoned weapons, U.S. Marines fighting their way through Iraq's rebel-infested Fallujah are ... more

Photo: ANJA NIEDRINGHAUS

Photo: ANJA NIEDRINGHAUS

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US Marines try to push into the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. Trooping past dead bodies and abandoned weapons, U.S. Marines fighting their way through Iraq's rebel-infested Fallujah are blasting their way through walls and hammering open doors seeking fighters and guns in the dayslong battle against Sunni Muslim insurgents. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus) less

US Marines try to push into the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. Trooping past dead bodies and abandoned weapons, U.S. Marines fighting their way through Iraq's rebel-infested Fallujah are ... more

2004-11-13 04:00:00 PDT Near Fallujah, Iraq -- Insurgents in trenches met advancing U.S. and Iraqi forces in southern Fallujah with a burst of bullets and rockets Friday in what commanders described as one of the fiercest days of fighting since the battle to retake the city began five days ago.

Marines and soldiers said they had encountered guerrillas dug into traditional defensive positions from which they could pop up, shoot and quickly take cover. The Americans said they and their Iraqi allies had fought back with rifles, automatic weapons, belt-fed machine guns, mortars and hand grenades.

Military officials also reported that fighting had resumed Thursday night in Fallujah's Jolan neighborhood, an insurgent stronghold in the city's northwest.

Elsewhere in Iraq, intense fighting continued for a third day in the northern city of Mosul and in other flash points in Iraq's Sunni Muslim heartland.

Lt. Gen. John Sattler, the Marine commander in Iraq, said 22 U.S. troops had been killed and more than 170 seriously wounded in and around Fallujah since the offensive began Sunday night. Another 490 troops suffered wounds but were able to return to duty, he said. In addition, Sattler said, five members of the Iraqi security forces have been killed and 40 wounded.

At a Marine outpost near the city, a steady stream of ambulances carried casualties to a naval field hospital where troops lay on stretchers, their wounds covered by white gauze.

Since moving into Fallujah on Monday, U.S. forces have largely gained control of the city's northern half while driving insurgents south. The U.S. military says it now controls about 80 percent of the city. Commanders had warned, however, that insurgents might try to make a last stand in southwestern districts.

By midmorning, after reportedly taking heavy casualties, the units trying to capture the area called in artillery and air support, unleashing a barrage of shells and bombs that engulfed the neighborhood in flames and smoke.

Witnesses reported another big battle in central Fallujah at the Rawtha Mohammediya mosque, which had served as the insurgents' headquarters but is now controlled by the Marines. About 200 to 300 fighters came from southern neighborhoods to stage the assault, but it ended after two hours with their suffering heavy losses, according to witnesses.

U.S. and Iraqi forces have detained 450 suspected insurgents. Thaer Hasen Naqib, spokesman for interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, said they included men from Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Syria.

"It really doesn't matter from which group they are," Naqib said during a news conference at a military outpost near Fallujah. "They are foreigners. They are not invited to come to Iraq. We want to get rid of them as soon as possible."

In Mosul, Iraq's third-largest city, Iraqi authorities and U.S. forces were struggling to maintain control as insurgents moved at will through large sections of the city, residents said. The military said 10 Iraqi national guardsmen and one American soldier had been killed Thursday in Mosul.

Insurgents attacked the headquarters of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of two Kurdish political parties, setting off a vicious firefight. At day's end the headquarters was still under Kurdish control.

The Mosul police force splintered under a wave of insurgent attacks on at least five police stations Thursday. Iraqi authorities dismissed Mosul's police chief, Brig. Gen. Mohammed Kheiri Barhawi, after local officials reported that officers were abandoning their stations to militants without firing a shot.

Iraqi national guard units were being rushed to the city from three directions, as were Kurdish forces from Irbil to the south.

Militants also assassinated the head of the city's anti-crime task force, Brig. Gen. Mowaffaq Mohammed Dahham, and set fire to his home.

Brig. Gen. Carter Ham, who commands U.S. forces in Mosul, said combat was less intense than the day before. Still, the situation was deemed sufficiently difficult that an Army light-armored unit was peeled away from Fallujah to reinforce the U.S. force in Mosul.

Ham said he doubted the Mosul attackers were insurgents who fled Fallujah and said most "were from the northern part of Iraq, in and around Mosul and the Tigris River valley that's south of the city."

Elsewhere, insurgents shot down a U.S. Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter near Taji, 12 miles north of Baghdad, wounding three crew members, the military said. It was the third downed helicopter this week, after two Marine Super Cobras succumbed to ground fire in the Fallujah operation.

Clashes also broke out from Hawija and Tal Afar in the north to Samarra and Ramadi in central Iraq.

Bands of armed men also continued to operate in Baghdad. Clashes were reported in the suburb of Abu Ghraib and the west Baghdad neighborhood of Ghazaliya. South of Baghdad, a U.S. soldier was killed and three people were wounded when insurgents attacked a patrol with a roadside bomb, rifle fire and rocket-propelled grenades.